


the way it’s night for many miles (and then suddenly it’s not).

by flustraaa



Series: it isn’t over yet, it’s just begun. [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anyways, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Nightmares, Sokka (Avatar) Has ADHD, Sokka (Avatar) Needs a Hug, Sokka (Avatar)-centric, Sokka (avatar) needs therapy, Therapy, Zuko (avatar) is a good friend, and i know you little shits will squint, angsty boi, dadkoda, like so bad, no beta we die like jet, zukka if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-12 00:41:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29501481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flustraaa/pseuds/flustraaa
Summary: he needs to feel his emotions, he needs to acknowledge them and give them time to exist in his frame— but sometimes when you close a door, it doesn’t open until someone kicks it down. sokka knows this. he always has.(or,sokka’s been through some shit and gertrude has absolutely zero chill).
Relationships: Bato & Sokka (Avatar), Hakoda & Sokka (Avatar), Katara & Sokka (Avatar), Sokka & The Gaang (Avatar), Sokka & Zuko (Avatar)
Series: it isn’t over yet, it’s just begun. [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2119551
Comments: 21
Kudos: 63





	the way it’s night for many miles (and then suddenly it’s not).

_** i. ** _

* * *

“Hi Sokka.” the therapist greets him, soft pink hair falling over her shoulders as she plays with the G2 pen in her fingertips. She’s wearing these absolutely massive black glasses that make her look like she’s from the seventies, and if Sokka were in any other circumstance, he’d probably like her a lot. “I’m Doctor Bier, but you can call me Gertrude— or Gertie. Whatever you’d like.” 

Sokka crosses his arms over his chest, cerulean irises focusing on a chip in the brick lining the wall to his left. He doesn’t want to be here— his dad promised he wouldn’t make Sokka go to therapy. 

“Is there anything you’d like to talk about, in particular?” His eyes don’t waiver from the point on the wall, a foot tapping against the ground as he gnaws on the inside of his mouth. 

He knows she’ll be like the other therapist— he knows that if he just gets he frustrated enough, she’ll finally leave him alone like he wants her to. 

Because Sokka doesn’t think he’s many things— but he knows how to pull strings. He knows how to blend in and how to hide under a façade. Sokka is twelve, and still he’s knows more about pretending than most people. 

He’s twelve and he’s looking at her with a quiet fire behind his eyes— the very kind that she saw in her own reflection all those years ago. 

“Sokka, I’m not here to lie to you. I’m not here to feed you propaganda or tell you that you’re fine. You’re hurting, and you hide that so deeply within yourself that it chokes you,” she sighs heartily, eyes so warm that Sokka’s breath catches in his throat and fear floods him.

And that’s how Sokka gets his ass handed to him at three in the afternoon by a woman with bubblegum pink hair and a PhD. She reads him like a book, and he hates her.

* * *

The next several times they meet— everything is dandy. Sokka colours in the stupid adult colouring book she gives him, and all is just swell. She tells him about the six step plan of processing trauma— he tells her he’s never experienced anything. 

He opens up— but only in the way Sokka knows how. He tells her about his hyper fixations, and info dumps in all the ways she’ll let him. 

She builds a safe environment, and what once felt like a trap now feels like it’s loosening it’s hold around his neck. 

But then, he comes in on the day after the five year anniversary of his mother’s death. He only comes because Bato hauled him away from his book on architecture in the ancient Roman world, and promised him ice cream. 

Needless to say, Sokka is refusing to do anything and he most certainly has not taken his Ritalin in a week and his life is falling apart at the seams as much as an thirteen-year-old’s life can fall apart at the seams. 

Stupid Gertrude sees right through him though— she has that stupid polka dot basket of fidget toys out and Sokka has the blue and white camouflage pattern spinner absolutely fucking zooming in his right hand as he allows his eyes to blur the wall in front of him. 

“So, Sokka—“ 

“I don’t want to be here.” He never does, but he supposes that’s never really mattered. “Not today.” 

“What’s so important about this week? About today?” she doesn’t flinch at his glare, not like he wanted her to. “Talk to me.” 

“I think you know already.” 

“So remind me,” she presses, and suddenly Sokka wonders if she’s trying to torture him. “What’s the significance?” 

“My mom died five years ago, yesterday.” 

He does not choke on the words. He hasn’t broken in five years, and he will not break down in front of his therapist of all people. 

“Why don’t we try to unpack that day?” 

Sokka shakes his head sharply, hissing out a low and threatening, “absolutely not.” 

“Do you remember those steps we’ve been doing?” She asks softly, and Sokka knows he’s being petulant— but something always has to give and when recently, he’s been resorting to anger before anything else. “Kid, do me a favour and lead me through the day it happened— and if you need to stop, we’ll stop and we won’t touch it again, okay?” 

Sokka doesn’t look at her, and she doesn’t force him to. She doesn’t sigh, she doesn’t yell— she just watches him quietly. 

And then, she does something odd, “I’m one of three kids, and when I was five I was diagnosed with GAD— or General Anxiety Disorder. When I was eight I was diagnosed with ADHD.” 

And then, for what feels like the first time— he opens up. 

“I got diagnosed with ADHD right before my mom died,” Sokka speaks suddenly, and in the moment she sees through him a little easier. “I don’t want to be here. I told my dad I’m fine. I am fine. I don’t need to be here.” 

“Here’s the thing, Kiddo. I was the same.” Sokka scoffs, rolling his eyes. “I’m serious. I always thought that I had to put on this brave face— that because I was the one that everyone wrote off as anxious, I thought I needed to be better than I thought I was. I thought I needed to be someone I didn’t want to be. It took me years and years and years to unlearn. And that’s okay.” 

The young boy’s eyebrows come together, and his hands drop into lap. She takes note of the way his index fingers pick at the skin on the sides of this thumbs— and the way his molars start working on the insides of his cheeks.

“Sokka, would it be alright if I told you what I’ve learned about you?” She waits for him to lash out— to cower, to tell her no. 

But, as always, he surprises her. He bobs his head up and down, eyes trained on the fidget spinner in his hand. 

“Alright, rad,” she sees his mouth quirk at the word choice. It falls quickly as she presses forward. “You hide your pain with humour— that is to say you’re quick to make people laugh. You accommodate everyone as well as you can, no matter how it inconveniences you.” 

He’s not looking at her, but she’s knows exactly what she’s thinking. 

“You’re stubborn, and recently you’ve started resorting to anger to hide your sadness. You haven’t let yourself feel because you’re too busy protecting others from their own heads. You hardly sleep, and—“

“Stop.” The spinner goes still, and he shakes his head. “Just stop. I didn’t ask to be made fun of.” 

She considers telling him they’re just observations, but it’s impossible to pretend that her notes didn’t sound like critiques of his character. 

He’s been seen— and he’s been trying to be invisible for so long, he’d forgotten what that felt like. “Would you like me to tell you what else I know about you?” 

He hesitates, chewing at his lip, “I don’t really want to know about my pitfalls, thanks.” 

“They’re not pitfalls,” she reassures him, voice softening as she turns down another path. “I’ve learned what sets you off, but I’ve also learned who you are. You’re smart— always inventing, always learning. You’re kind— you talk about family and friends often, they come easiest to you—“ 

But something about that phrase demolishes whatever foundation shes built— and then she realises, no, she didn’t break his trust. She struck a nerve, one that he’d tried desperately to hide. 

The word family flutters around in her head, and like that Sokka pulls his feet off the cushion of the couch, black vans hitting the floor as he pushes the strands of hair from his eyes. 

“Sokka—“

“I’m fine,” he grits, sounding dangerously close to tears. “And I’m not fucking crying. My eyes are just sweating.” 

But then he looks at her, and something in her breaks watching him snap in the way he does. He swipes a hand over his eyes, and in that moment the past five years of pent up emotions break through the dam and he’s ripping his black sweatshirt from his body. 

Left in a well-worn Nirvana shirt, he balls the fabric up and shoved his face into it with his right hand, and with his left he grips his thighs with the intent of bruising. 

Suddenly, she’s grateful this happened fifteen minutes in to their session— watching as this ruined kid desperately tries (and fails) to shove his emotions back into his frame. 

He collects (she thinks collect might be a really, really strong word, seeing as he’s still struggling to breathe) himself in fifteen minutes— eyes bloodshot and wiping a particularly gross wad of snot from his nose. 

_Homeboy_ , he thinks to himself, _you are not a pretty crier._ It doesn’t lift his mood. 

She asks, “How long has it been since you cried?” 

He’s not sure why he answers, not sure why this particular question is the one that got him to open, but it does. 

He responds, “I don’t know. A long time.” 

“Did you cry the day she died?” 

His eyebrows come together, reaching for another tissue, “no— I just knew something-“ 

He heaves out a sigh, wiping a forearm across his in a sloppy attempt at drying the tears.

He tries again, “I have white outs from that day— I don’t remember a lot of it. I remember getting called out of class and seeing Katara in the hall. I remember knowing she was dead.” 

_This_ , Gertrude finds, _is something Hakoda hadn’t told her at their meeting._

“You knew?” She questions after he’s stopped talking, “who had told you? The way you find out can greatly impact the way you process.” 

He bites his lip, and she can see the cogs in his head turning. She knows he’s regretting speaking, and that if he stops talking— that’s going to have to be enough for today. 

But then he slowly admits, “no— I— Gertrude. I _knew_. Everything was all wrong, mom wasn’t there to pick me up and dad was acting weird and they wouldn’t call us both down so I just asked.” 

“You asked?” 

“I looked at my dad and asked if mom was dead,” he says it like it chokes him, “I asked him and the secretaries went silent, and I thought that if I could say it out loud— maybe it wouldn’t be true. It was something too awful to say out loud.” 

She nods, and Sokka, for the first time, doesn’t feel judged— he doesn’t get made fun of for being the the weird kids who knew before he was told. He didn’t get called physic or freak anymore. 

“And then?” 

His lips pull into a thin line, and his balled fist finds its home bruising his outer thigh as tears threaten to spill.

“And then I don’t remember anything until ice cream with my dad— and the next morning I woke up and thought it was all a dream.” 

“And how does that make you feel?” 

It’s supposed to make him laugh, but instead he kind of looks like he wants to throttle her. She doesn’t really blame him for that one, she supposes. 

“ _Huh_ ,” he bites back, words dripping with sarcasm, “I’ve never been asked that one before.”

* * *

By the end of the session, Sokka is sitting on the couch with his head in his knees trying to figure out what on La’s blue waves breathing feels like.

He hears Bato and Gertrude talking quietly in the corner of the room, he hears a few unfamiliar words tossed around thay sound suspiciously like names of anti-anxiety medications.

But he’d also felt the way Bato had come to a screeching halt when he’d seen Sokka in his current state, he’d felt Katara pull his head into he lap with the confidence only a twelve-year-old could have.

He doesn’t make an attempt to move— he wonders, distantly, if anyone has a session after him.

After a while, Bato hauls him to his feet and gives him a free piggy back ride— Sokka can’t feel his arms or his cheeks. He crashes hard against the window of Bato’s blue truck, and wakes up with his face smashed into the fleece of the coat Katara always forgets in the car.

He asks what happened, Bato brushes him off and offers him another piggy back ride to his room.

He wakes up to his dad hovering over him— the same dad that was meant to be on a business trip for the next week, the same dad who looks like he did on the day he lost his wife.

“Dad?” He mumbles, voice hoarse and threatening to choke him. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing, Socks.” he smiles a bit, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “I just— thought maybe hanging out with you was a little more important than reviewing a new plan with my board.”

He rests a hand on his son’s shoulder, knowing full and well that Sokka has been incredibly keen on being a menace lately. He waits for his son to shove his hand away, but instead his thirteen-year-old crawls into his arms in the way he should’ve years ago.

“Do you feel safe with Doctor Bier, Sokka?”

“I talked about mom,” the words are a knife to Hakoda’s chest, but he can’t bite back the wet laugh when Sokka adds, “talked is a strong word. I sobbed a lot.” 

_** ii. ** _

* * *

The whole feeling and expressing emotions, as it happens, is a lot more complicated than crying once and then being able to cry frequently and freely. 

Sokka, as it turns out, isn’t done being angry and is chalked full of poorly repressed anger.

He’s angry, and he misses his mom and he just wants to be numb— he wants to go back to pretending that nothing affects him— that he’s untouchable, and the worst problem he has is trying to find a funny joke to tell Yue in his third period class.

Because Sokka is thirteen, and stupid fucking Mr. DiMarino one thousand percent told Sokka’s dad that he had a panic attack in second period.

And stupid fucking Josh called him a freak and the new girl, Suki, definitely punched Josh in the face and got detention for a week and Sokka’s life is definitely in shambles.

He doesn’t need her to fight his fights for him, and he definitely doesn’t need any friends— but then she’d looked at him with a smile holding out the hand with dried blood before laughing quietly and offering the other.

And Sokka almost starts crying again.

Suki panics and hugs him, and then he really _does_ start crying.

And then Bato picks him up, because— of coursehe does, he works at the high school down the street, and he lets Sokka sit in his office while he teaches his classes.

And when tries to put a hand on Sokka’s shoulder, the younger boy shoves him away, bypasses Gran-gran and the snack she’s made him and Katara, and slams the door behind him.

Later that night, Hakoda will see him pulling at his hair as he tries to focus on his homework, and he will think of Bato saying that Sokka had shoved him away.

He will rest a hand on Sokka’s shoulder when he finds him struggling with his homework in a way that isn’t necessarily uncommon, but one that is worrying.

Sokka will shove him away, and Sokka will tell him that he doesn’t need anyone— and that will be the day that Hakoda realises that his son pushes away everyone who tries to get close.

It’s will be that day that Hakoda realises everything that’s happened in the last five years in a defence mechanism— he will realise he laughs to throw people off his trail, and that he rarely smiles with his eyes.

When people get close, he pushes away.

Hakoda doesn’t know what he says it, but he does, and he can’t take it back. “You can’t be scared of losing people close to you, Socks. If you don’t let us get close, you’ll be worse of when we’re gone.”

“You’re not leaving,” Sokka hisses back, gripping his pencil so hard his knuckles turn white. “You’re not allowed to leave me too.”

Hakoda realises then that Sokka isn’t just angry or sad, he’s distraught— and he’s left without hope. And those are things a child— _his_ child, should never be.

* * *

Something about the way dinner had come and gone without coming down to eat the baeckeoffe that Gran-gran had made for dinner doesn’t sit right with Katara.

Knowing full and well that her dad could see her struggling to scoop the stupid, frozen pint of superman ice cream into Sokka’s favourite bowl, she’d allowed him to come over and help her out.

She didn’t say a word, and he never asked where she was going with the ice-cream that very likely could stain the white-beige carpet of her older brother’s room.

What she finds, is Sokka lying beneath his navy blue comforter in a way that she’d become familiar with in the past few months.

She’d thought he was faking sleep for a long few moments, before she’d called his name and he’d blinked at her groggily, “Katara?”

“You missed dinner.” she’d mumbled in lieu of an answer, already crawling onto his duvetas he’d moved over to make room for her— because no matter how much he hated the world, he was always her big brother first. “I brought you some ice-cream.”

He’d stared at her for a long moment, still clearly dazed from his nap, “thanks, ‘Tara.”

She didn’t say anything, only humming a quiet affirmation before eating a spoonful of her own dessert, as Sokka reaches over to turn on his table lamp.

A moment passes, trickling into several before she speaks again. “I’m worried about you.”

His lips dip into a frown, and she regrets speaking when he sets this spoon back in the tie-dye treat.

“You don’t need to worry about me.” He says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world— like he doesn’t realise she’s watching him slip away. “I’m fine.”

“You’re not fine.” and when Katara looks at him with that stubborn set in her jaw, and a fire lit beneath her icy eyes he knows he’ll never get away with it. “You’re a ghost, Sokka. You never eat, or sleep— Gran-gran said you haven’t taken your Ritalin in month. You’re always lashing out at dad and at Bato— you even snap at me sometimes.”

He blinks, picking at the ice-cream as he swallows with some difficulty, “ _Katara_ —“

“No,” her voice doesn’t waiver, “Sokka, it’s okay to be angry.”

It’s not what he was expecting at all, “Katara, I don’t want to be angry anymore. It’s not who I am.”

She pauses, staring at the Star Wars poster on Sokka’s door, “then cry.”

His eyebrows furrow, “What?”

“Just cry,” she reiterates, “it won’t fix everything, but it might help. You’ve been holding it in for too long.”

Sokka almost laughs— almost. He thinks it’s the stupidest plan he’s ever heard, but then his scoff quickly melts into a sob.

Katara sets their bowls on the bedside tables, and guides her older brother’s head to her shoulder, closing her eyes as his weeping cries wrack his body.

Hakoda and Kanna hear him, and when they finally make their way upstairs they pop the door open to find their twelve year old comforting her big brother just as he’d held her together for the past five years.

Hakoda thinks, they still have each other— and as if reading his thoughts his mother smacks his arm and scolds him, “they have you and I still. We’re not leaving them Hakoda.” 

And he supposes she’s right.

_** iii. ** _

* * *

Sokka’s hasn’t had a sleepover since he was eight— he was always terrified he’d have a nightmare and scare away his friends by having the misfortune of screaming them both awake

But the years pass and his nightmares become less and less, so when he turns fifteen he invites one friend over to spend the night.

Zuko agrees easily, gifting Sokka with a brand new copy of _The Song of Achilles_ , a book on Norwegian architecture, and quite possibly the coolest hockey stick Sokka has ever seen.

They hug, and Zuko says it not a big deal— as if anyone has ever taken the time to get to know Sokka and the things he focuses on.

(“ _I’m going to tell you about Norwegian architecture for the next month and a half, I hope you know that.”_

_With a careful smile, Zuko replies, “I look forward to it.”_ ). 

The night goes well— they watch a movie, and Zuko, who is consistently sleep-deprived, falls asleep first. Sokka glances over at him to make a comment on how much he hates the way cinema portrays female heroines so frequently wrapped in love triangles, and instead, finds Zuko with his face buried between the couch cushion and the back rest.

His hand dangles precariously over the edge of the seat, blanket secure over his shoulders, and pillow on the floor.

Sokka snorts quietly at his best friend, returning his attention to the screen. He doesn’t realise he’s falling asleep until he’s screaming himself awake and the light snap on around him.

Cerulean finds gold, and soon he realises he’s not the only one shaking, “are you okay?”

Zuko’s forehead wrinkles, “me? Are you okay?”

“You’re shaking,” Sokka blurts dumbly, but then realise how raspy he sounds— the way his breaths get caught in his throat. “Oh— _oh_. Was I screaming?”

Zuko nods slowly, takes a deep breath, and flips off the lights before returning to the couch.

“What are you—“

“Move over,” there’s the broody dumbass he knows and loves, a scowl on Zuko’s lips as he shoves his way under Sokka’s blanket.

Sokka watches as he grasps at _The Song of Achilles,_ hands latching onto a book light as he goes.

But Sokka never really got an answer to his question, and consequently repeats, “what are you doing?”

“When I have nightmares, my Uncle reads to me sometimes,” it’s information that he’s glad to have— something that makes him feel less silly about still waking up screaming for his mom, “get comfortable. Even if you can’t fall asleep, it should help.”

“Zuko, it’s so cute that you think I will ever fall asleep again,” he watches as Zuko’s cheeks flush with colour, a hand coming up to thwack Sokka in the shoulder. “ _Ow_!”

“You deserved it,” he mutters, letting out a sigh before reading from the page. “ _My father was a king and the son of kings. He was a short man, as most of us were, and built like a bull, all shoulders. He married my mother when she was fourteen and sworn by the priest is to be fruitful—_ “

Sokka allows a quiet sigh to pass through his lips, resting his head on Zuko’s shoulder as he follows along with the words on the page.

And if Hakoda peers around the corner of the steps to check on them half an hour later, and finds Zuko, himself, half asleep as he reads to a sound asleep Sokka— he keeps it to himself. 

Sokka’s eyes open to light peaking in through the windows that line along the walls of the basement, the weight of his best friend’s cheek balanced on the crown of his own head.

The book lies on Zuko’s lap, one of his hands lies slotted between the page and the other rests across his lap.

He debates his options for a long moment, before deciding that the smoothest way to get out of this is to just sit up slowly and let his friend sleep.

This, as Sokka’s plans occasionally do, fails miserably, and Zuko jolts awake with a startled snort dripping from his lips. A moment passes before he focuses his eyes on Sokka, squinting at the light for a moment before speaking.

“Hey, are you feeling better?”

Sokka finds himself nodding, and despite himself, he only replies with a soft, “Thank you, Zuko.”

Zuko sends him a sideways grin, pushing the fringe out of his face before stretching and yawning.

And Sokka, who had once been terrified of sleepovers, feels safe and free of judgement.

Because Zuko shows up— and when he screams himself awake, his newest friend doesn’t waiver. Instead, he crawls under the sheets and reads to him Sokka holds the light and follows along.

( _Later, Sokka will inquire, “Zu, how often to you get nightmares?”_

_Zuko will flash a shy smile, and tell him, “enough to understand.”_ ).

_** iv. ** _

* * *

The day comes when Sokka decides maybe he should spill his guts to his best friend— that he should explain why he wakes up screaming when, and why his dad refers to his years of being The Ultimate Douche™ as the terrible tweens.

But the decision is made for him one night, when they’re watching some random chick flick— and the car flips into a ditch.

And for the first time in years, Sokka positively blanks— he doesn’t realises he’s balls deep in a panic attack until Zuko is helping him ground himself.

Everything is muffled, and the wooden floor of the family room and the feeling of the wall on his back is enough to make Sokka want to try to understand the soft words that Zuko is whispering.

He’s not sure when Zuko leaves— or even when he comes back, all he can process is that he feels like he’s fucking drowning and literally anything would be more comfortable than this.

He’s not sure how long has passed, just that when he finally pulls himself out of it, his back is still anchored to the wall and his hands are no longer on the floor, but wrapped around his shins in a death grip.

He glances over at Zuko, who’s sitting criss cross apple sauce with his hands resting on his lap, thumbs fidgeting as he picks at his thumb with his index finger.

_Hey_ , Sokka thinks, _he does that too._

Zuko doesn’t speak, watching Sokka warily before slowly picking up the reusable cup and equipped with a lid straw from his side.

“Drink, it’ll help— but you know that. I— here.” Sokka takes the cup from Zuko shakily, water sloshing around as he tries to steady himself.

“Thank you,” his voice comes out so quietly he’s surprised Zuko hears it at all, but the crooked smile of acknowledgment is enough to confirm that he had.

They sit there for a long time, both teenagers silent before Sokka quietly pats the ground. Zuko obliges readily, pressing his back against the wall and letting Sokka rest his head on his shoulder.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Sokka pauses, licking his lips and taking another sip of water, before nodding. “I think— I do.”

Zuko falls silent, letting Sokka take any and all motion tactility that he needs— he even runs his thumb quietly over the back of Sokka’s knuckles when his breaths start hitching again.

“I guess it all starts when I was eight,” he mumbles, eyebrows coming together. “And not necessarily where you’d think— my mom died, but I didn’t have problems with like watching car crashes until I accidentally opened pictures of the crash that were in this envelope. I was nine when I saw it, and after that I wouldn’t get in a car for a year.”

He makes it through the story until he starts talking about the terrible tween years of profession douchebag behaviour— he tells him about his first panic attack in Gertrude’s office,and he tells Zuko about the day that Katara came into his room and let him cry himself to sleep on her shoulder. 

He tells Zuko that he used to bury everything under anger in a desperate attempt to preserve the numbness that shook him to his core. He tells Zuko that he would lash out at everyone, he tells him that he got called a freak for knowing what had happened.

He tells Zuko about getting diagnosed with ADHD, he tells Zuko that for a long time that the way kids interacted with him still sucked absolute ass.

He tells Zuko about the time Suki broke Josh’s nose defending him, and.... he just keeps going, until he’s running out of words.

Zuko just nods along, making quiet sounds to ensure that Sokka knows he’s listening— that he’s processing all of this.

Sokka doesn’t realise his eyes are closing until Zuko squeezes his upper arm softly, pulling him out of his doze.

“Hm?”

“You’re falling asleep— do you want to move to the couch?” It’s not a demand or suggestion, it’s a genuine question.

“Can we stay here?”

“Yeah.” Zuko mumbles, shifting a bit to allow Sokka to rest against his thigh. “Whatever you want, buddy.”

“Tell me a something I dunno,” Sokka mumbles, sniffing as he wipes the tell-tale signs of his— well, last two hours, away, “something you don’t tell anyone.”

“I used to have a lisp.” He tilts his head back against the wall. “My mom took me to speech therapy, but sometimes it comes back. When I’m tired or sometimes when I get upset.”

Sokka tells him, “I never even noticed.”

“I’ll give your compliments to my speech pathologist.” He doesn’t see the dopey grin on Zuko’s face.

_** v. ** _

* * *

Sokka learns to breathe and allows himself to exist one step at a time. It’s on days like today, the days right after Suki’s high school graduation party, where they all sit curled up on the floor and couches of Suki’s basement, that he realises he doesn’t have to be anything more than he is. 

He doesn’t have to pretend, and he doesn’t have to hold back— ten years have passed since the day his life felt like it had fallen apart, and five years have passed since he’d fallen apart in Gertrude’s office.

Sokka is eighteen, and he’s sprawled out on Zuko’s lap eyes dazedly trained on whatever marvel movie is playing before them. 

Sokka is eighteen, and he is learning that shitty events do not necessarily equate to a shitty existence. 

Because he is eighteen, and all of his friends love him— and the one weird kid from the back of his Latin class that he was too nice to is braiding Sokka’s hair that is well overdue for a hair cut. 

“Give me your hair tie,” Zuko mutters, opening and closing his hand for Sokka to drop the elastic into. “Thank you.”

“Am I the prettiest?” Sokka teases, batting his eyelashes, “would you write another poem about me?”

“I was fifteen and confused. One of these days,” Zuko growls, turning back to the television, “I am going to strangle you.”

“ _Kinky_.”

It earns Sokka a flick to the forehead, and a loud snort from Toph, “Sparky, you wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

“I totally would.” He huffs out a sigh, pressing his back against the arm rest, “no, I wouldn’t.” 

“That’s what I thought.” Sokka sends him an award winning smile, grabbing Zuko’s and depositing it on his head in a silent command.

Wordlessly, Zuko scratches softly at Sokka’s scalp as he returns his focus to the movie— and before long, Sokka finds himself waking up half off the couch— with his best friend behind him and the room still sound asleep around him.

The title screen of a movie that he does not remember watching loops before him, and he realises that he didn’t have a nightmare that night.

He lies there for a long time, staring at the ceiling until his stomach growls for the ninth time, and he regrets waking up at all.

“Your stomach,” Zuko slurs, and suddenly Sokka remembers when his friend had told him about the lisp. “Needs to shut the fuck up.”

“Oh, well, I’ll make sure Sokka Junior gets the message, Zuko, thanks for the reminder.”

His friend chuckles quietly, still half asleep as he readjusts against Sokka’s shoulder. He’s back asleep before the latter can get another word out, and maybe, Sokka thinks, this isn’t the worst way to spend a summer morning.

He’s still healing, he thinks, and the really good days— the ones like this, are just as much apart of growth as the bad ones are. 

**Author's Note:**

> stay hydrated and don’t forget to tell me what you thought in the comments :)


End file.
